In China, Taoism instructs that in any circumstance the right action is whatever serves Tao, the greater intelligence working around and through us. In medieval Christianity, the highest achievement was called the Unitive Vision, in which “Thy will becomes my will.” India’s Hindu tradition teaches that the world is infused with divine energy, and a most holy prayer is Tat tvam asi, or “that [Brahman] art thou,” meaning that you are God. The Bhagavad Gita tells us, “The world is imprisoned in its own activity except when actions are performed as worship of God.”
The modern conception of “I” is quite the opposite of what is described in these wisdom traditions. We are taught that each person is a private entity standing apart from all other life in the universe. It seems as if this “I” directs the body like a driver operates a car. It is difficult to locate “I”— though many would say that it is centered in the brain and leaves off at the edge of the skin.
That captivating rogue and philosopher of the East, Alan Watts, once said that the modern sense of “I” is a tremendous trap. Your body gets tired, becomes sick, and eventually runs down and dies. Meanwhile, Watts noted, we do our best to maximize pleasure and minimize pain in a world “full of stupid people, who are sometimes nice to you, but mostly aren’t. They’re all out for themselves like you are, and therefore, there’s one hell of a conflict going on.” He aptly describes the alienation of modern life.’
It is natural that we have an identity, this “I” inside; it helps us to grow in many different ways. Most of us have cultural obligations such as earning a living, taking care of our families, and so on, and we need strong and capable egos.
Unfortunately the gift of human consciousness can also feel like a curse. As Watts says, our sense of “I” becomes a lonely and isolating shell. However, there is a way out: the “I” must learn to carry out its daily responsibilities while also serving something greater.
Going Beyond Self-Interest
To gain contentment, modern people need more than strong egos; we also must have access to a source of comfort and wisdom from beyond “I.” We experience lack of meaning whenever we view ourselves as creatures whose lives have no positive relation to something beyond ourselves. Jung wrote that the decisive question for the modern person is: “Is he [or she] related to something infinite or not? We count for something only because of the essential we embody, and if we do not embody that, life is wasted.”
The original meaning of the word religion is to rerelate or reconnect—to put back together again, heal the wounds of separation, and to make whole. Contentment grows, not out of pursuing self-interest, but from our capacity to connect to a larger whole—family, social groups, nature, and, ultimately, God. Some people have trouble with the word God, but all that is really required here is a willingness to acknowledge a power greater than yourself.
Jung believed that the psychological goal of human life is gradually to recenter the personality from the ego to the Self. Describing this process, he wrote, “Although it is able to preserve its structure, the ego is ousted from its central and dominating position and thus finds itself in the role of a passive observer who lacks the power to assert his will under all circumstances. … In this way the will gradually subordinates itself to the stronger factor, namely to the new totality figure I call the Self. ”2
The Self, as Jung defines it, embraces not only the conscious but also the unconscious psyche. The Self is an “unknowable essence,” Jung said, but it might equally be called the “God within us,” since all of our highest and ultimate purposes seem to be striving toward it.
To achieve true contentment, our egos must be in meaningful relationship to a steady anchor whose security does not depend upon ever-shifting external events. Depth psychology describes this conscious union as the alignment of the ego and the Self. The process of reclaiming our wholeness requires both the ego and the unconscious, paying due regard to the demands of both.
Whom Does the King Serve?
Shakespeare describes the same process using much more poetic and inspirational language. Recall that at the beginning of Shakespeare’s story, Lear rules according to whatever he thinks will bring him pleasure, power, ease, or entertainment. But a king represents more than a single individual; he is the personification of the entire kingdom and must serve a greater whole.
Lear is, in many ways, like the ailing Fisher King from the medieval Grail legend, a man who cannot find a way out of his suffering. Lear’s attempt to solve problems using the wrong tools is the central core of Shakespeare’s tragedy. His suffering could not have been avoided simply by choosing better. Choosing is the domain of the ego, and it is the instrument of his choosing that must be transformed. He must gain wisdom that comes from a relationship with the mystery that is beyond “I.” The King (please remember this refers to your inner King) must serve a greater whole.
We have seen that the earl of Gloucester was redeemed through a sacrifice, as represented by an imaginary leap over the cliffs of Dover. The critical turning point for Lear occurs when he is left shivering out in the rain. The king stops blustering and complaining and instead begins paying attention to someone else. He turns to his companion and asks, “How dost, my boy? Art cold?” As the play progresses, Lear gradually gains humility and connects his suffering with the suffering of other living creatures. He develops his inner capacity for compassion and love.
To Sing like Birds in a Cage
As the story of King Lear draws to a conclusion, the old king is reunited with his one loyal daughter, Cordelia. Both are in exile, the kingdom is in chaos, and the destructive, unconscious forces are competing for power and leaving a trail of wreckage. The armies of Goneril and Regan are about to overtake the camp of Lear and Cordelia. Facing certain capture, Lear makes a wonderful speech.
“Come, let’s away to prison,” he says. “We two alone will sing like birds in the cage. / When thou dost ask me blessing, I’ll kneel down / And ask of thee forgiveness. So we’ll live, / And pray, and sing, and tell old tales, and laugh / At gilded butterflies, and hear poor rogues / Talk of court news. And we’ll talk with them too, / Who loses and who wins; who’s in, who’s out; / And take upon us the mystery of things, / As if we were God’s spies; and we’ll wear out, / In a walled prison, packs and sects of great ones / That ebb and flow by the moon.”
This is poetic language saying that he now understands the walled prison of his court and sees with a new clarity and depth of vision the pettiness and intrigues that have fueled his discontent.
This is what each of us must learn to do—to sit in the nonsense of our court with its daily upsets, disappointments, and changes. Court news is all the stuff that fills the morning newspaper: who loses and who wins, who’s in and who’s out. It all passes like clouds in the sky, and with hardly any more importance.
“We’ll live and pray, and sing, and tell old tales, and laugh at gilded butterflies,” the king says. That which had worn Lear down and made him so angry and tired before now produces laughter.
Lear comes to understand that the stuff of the court is really about as substantial as the ebbing and flowing of the moon. He accepts the imperfections of the world as part of the play of God. Lear sees it all—the joys and the sorrows, the victories and the defeats—and he can laugh, the merriment of insight, not the derision of bitterness. The enlightened person can participate in the daily frustrations and absurdities of life while simultaneously understanding them as divine play.
Contentment is not found by Lear outside of ordinary experience. He does not withdraw from the world or attempt to escape his suffering. Instead, he finds sacredness in the midst of his anguish.
There is a human tendency to turn even spirituality into an attempt to get what we want. For example, we may pray to God to help us avoid suffering. This represents a fundamental confusion between serving the desires of the ego and serving the divine. We get closer to the divine by accepting that suffering cannot be escaped, but must be embraced as part of life. “Following your bliss” is not a call to narcissism and getting what you want. It is pursuing the rapture that resides at the core of your suffering.
In the tragedy of King Lear we see human suffering pushed to extremes: Lear loses his kingdom, his friend and loyal supporter Gloucester is blinded, he is betrayed by two of his daughters, and his one loyal daughter is hanged shortly after being reconciled with her father. Yet Lear finds contentment!
The example of Lear provides a prototype for how we can work with our own suffering. Neurotic suffering, in which we look for blame and remain victims, goes nowhere. Creative suffering involves affirming all that comes our way—even those circumstances that we don’t want and would never choose.
A friend recently referred to a “positive” event in his life as proof that God exists. It was pointed out, perhaps injudiciously, that his faith in God was very thin if he could find the divine only in experiences that he liked. He had a hard time hearing this, but if one clings only to positive inflations for the meaning of life one stands on very insecure ground.
Amazing Grace
Anything that emanates from the personal “I,” any decision of what you want or don’t want, is one-sided. Contentment requires connecting with a totality that is beyond the apparent contradictions of daily life, a totality that reconciles those contradictions. But you can’t just go out and acquire this divine perspective. If you turn spiritual pursuit into a project, going after enlightenment as the ultimate “high,” one more “goody” to make you happy, assuage your fears, or remove life’s sufferings, you just become inflated.
Many people misconstrue this truth and believe that contentment is the ego getting what it wants. Recentering the personality does not mean manipulating things so that the ego can get its way. You will be greatly disappointed if this is your goal.
Now we are caught in a vicious circle. In seeking contentment, we are like the proverbial donkey chasing a carrot on a stick. If he stands still, he does not get the carrot, but if he chases after it, he still doesn’t catch it. What can he do?
The answer is this: you don’t need to do anything. Your pursuit of contentment assumes that there is something the “I” can do beyond its ordinary tasks, and it is this very conceit that is the problem. It is hard for us to let go of our pride and accept that “what is” is.
You cannot acquire contentment like some consumer item, but you can awaken to its gifts. It is closer to the truth to say that contentment comes to us as divine grace.
Discovering Divine Potential
Although you cannot force contentment through an act of will, you can set the stage for its deliverance by seeking out divine potential in ordinary, day-to-day circumstances.
In the Hasidic tradition, great emphasis is placed on finding the divine in daily acts, particularly relationships with other people. The wonderful Jewish philosopher and theologian Martin Buber made a useful distinction between “I and it” versus “I and Thou” relationships. In “I and it” relationships, we treat other people as objects. An object is something that can be controlled, ignored, manipulated, and used for our own selfish purposes. Modern lives are filled with “I and it” relationships.
There is a yearning in each of us to be fully met by others, to be accepted for who we are, and to be imagined by others as the best person we are capable of being. In “I and Thou” relationships, other people are perceived as carriers of shared humanity as well as divine potential. Instead of treating other people as objects to be manipulated, you look for the best possible experience in every circumstance. No encounter lacks hidden significance.
What would your day be like if in every interaction with another you treated that person not just as a means to some end but as the very point and fulfillment of your life? How might it feel if you were treated this way? Such a day would surely bring a real measure of contentment.
Marriage as Spiritual Identity
When we allow ourselves to be truly related to others, our usual boundaries of self luxuriously expand, demonstrating that our sense of “I” need not be a lonely, isolating shell.
The mythologist Joseph Campbell once said that marriage, properly understood, is recognition of a spiritual identity. By marrying or committing to the right person, you create the potential for a greater whole. When there is conflict, each partner must learn to sacrifice their “I” for the unity of the relationship. It is not a matter of “my” needs versus “your” needs, but what is needed by the marriage. For example, if your will is pitted against the will of your partner, ask this: What is needed for the greater good? What will contribute to your goal as a couple or as a family? Of course, this requires that you let go of your “I’s” desire to control and get its way. Properly understood, marriage can be a spiritual exercise, the realization of two into a greater one.
Recognizing the divine potential in any situation cannot be reduced to a tidy formula, but one general guideline is to ask yourself what is needed for wholeness in any situation. Instead of asking, “What’s in it for me?,” you consider, “What is whole-making?” What is required for more wholeness will be different for each person, and it changes constantly. This requires realigning yourself each day, each hour, and each moment.
Grace is in doing. To support its realization you might begin an achievement journal; this is simply a record of how you are attending to divine potential and how your experience changes as a result. When we can live in this fashion, it has a profound effect on the quality of our lives, creating the conditions for grace and contentment.
Getting Past the Oppositions Inside You
Internal opposition can grind our contentment to bits. Most modern people spend a great deal of their life energy supporting this warfare within themselves and opposing their own situation. Just listen to a conversation among friends, and you will hear a recital of all the things that are going wrong in life.
To transform contradiction into contentment requires that you allow both sides of an issue to exist in equal dignity and worth. For example, you should be finishing your work this morning, but you don’t feel like it and would rather go for a hike. These two contradictory wishes will cancel each other out if you let them remain in opposition. You might stay in and work with a resentful attitude, or you might take your hike and feel guilty. Or, you could devise a compromise, such as taking a short walk and then settling down to get some work done. A compromise like this can be useful. An even better approach is to allow your unconscious to contribute to a deeper understanding, putting your life in better perspective and finding a solution that is better than either alternative.
Sit down in a quiet place, take a few deep breaths, quiet the noise of your mind, and listen. The objective is to avoid a neurotic struggle that pits one desire against another. It is valuable to produce good work and to meet your commitments, but it also is valuable to exercise, relax, and play. What is the greater whole that encompasses both these virtues? The exact solution is hard to describe, since it depends upon the particularity of your life and it must arise from the dynamics of the opposing energies that are facing each other.
Perhaps you need to adjust your priorities and your schedule for a better balance of work and play. Maybe you need to become more playful in your work—work and play need not be compartmentalized. Life is creative and explores itself through play. Bring play into your work to discover what is possible.
Listening to the divine voice within is like developing a “sixth sense,” which can become more acute with practice. You approach the inner Self with patient expectation, surrendering your own ideas and wishes and humbly asking for guidance. Here is another example: You have reached an impasse in your job and cannot decide how to proceed. Formulate a question in your mind that has a “yes” or “no” answer, such as: “Should I continue with this job?” When you honestly and sincerely surrender to the inner process, an answer will come to you that “feels right.” It may be received through a dream, a flood of inner feeling, body language, or in a gesture. It may even come to you in musical form.
When one of us, Jerry, was recently considering a move to a different city he collected all the relevant information, visiting the city, conducting job interviews, and touring potential new homes. This information gathering is the proper work of the ego. Upon returning home, however, he decided to turn the decision over to the unconscious. In a manner similar to petitionary prayer, he asked the divine for guidance. It came spontaneously in the melody of an old song performed by the Beatles titled “Wait.” The chorus of that song echoed through his thoughts all day long. The inner guide did not say specifically what to do, but it was abundantly clear that the time was not right for such a move. Although in this example the ego was itching to make a move, it bowed to the wisdom of the Self and “waited.”
If you receive nothing in inner guidance it may indicate that you should take no action, that your conscious situation has not yet contributed enough, or that there is a deeper question to be formulated.
Wisdom from the unconscious often suggests an alternative that goes beyond the seeming contradictions of life. It may provide a new perspective or meaning in which the contradiction doesn’t entirely go away, but no longer seems important or relevant. To view the, elements of life as paradoxical rather than contradictory is to open up a whole new series of possibilities. It is our inability to see a hidden unity that is problematic. To accept paradox is to earn the right to unity. (For an extended discussion of aligning the ego with the Self, please see our earlier book, Balancing Heaven and Earth, HarperSanFrancisco, 1998.)
The Daily Dance of Life
The “I” inside each of us thinks that contentment will arrive “just as soon as” it has mastered reality. In truth, contentment is the art of embracing reality. The Upanishads say: This is perfection, and that is perfection. If you mix the two together, that is perfection. And if you withdraw perfection from that, what remains is perfection. This is nice poetry, but what do you do with it? Well, you accept that “what is” is. If anything is God, then surely reality must be God.
Unfortunately, it often takes an illness, a loss, or a tragedy of some kind before we realize that individual willpower cannot master reality. When your “I” is ousted from its central and dominating position, it feels like pure suffering. If, instead, you can align your conscious position with something greater, then the suffering can be made meaningful and utilized in life.
Earlier we alluded to Arusakumar, the contented coconut seller in southern India. He sees the will of God in all that crosses his path—the disappointments and defeats as well as the joys and victories. Contentment comes, not only from getting what he wants, but also from wanting what he gets. He accepts that “what is” is divinely inspired.
What many pre-modern people do as a matter of course, because their culture supports them in it, we must achieve as a conscious process. Learning when to assert our wills and when to let go and unconditionally accept “what is”—this is a supreme accomplishment. We can approach this give-and-take as a clumsy, chaotic struggle or as a graceful, choreographed dance. The difference is a measure of our contentment.
1Alan Watts, Ego (Millbrae, CA: Celestial Arts, 1975).
2Jung, Collected Works, 8:224.